Top Posts & Pages

The Hole in My Front Yard

I’m starting to feel a little bit like I’m living in a Little House on the Prairie novel. Ma has to go fetch a pail of water to do the cookin’ and the cleanin’. The Nerdling has to go use the outhouse next door… We really get spoiled with our running water…

We came home from a 5 day vacation to a wet sidewalk. We didn’t think much about it at first, thinking something spilled, it rained, or someone from the church had watered our lawn. But when we noticed it was still there a day later, we realized we had a leak.

So I dug.

I dug and dug and dug. We just kept going down farther and farther. Every 4 inches or so, we’d come across a root growing through our path that had to be cut. The ground was a thick sticky clay that had to be knocked off our shovels by beating them against the ground. The hole kept filling up with water from the leak. It was slow going.

Sarlacc pit?

We called out the city’s water guys. They showed us the meter. We were loosing about a gallon a minute!! For who knows how many days! They shut off the meter and we resumed digging. Finally, over four feet into the earth, we hit pipe! We found the leaky culprit hiding deep in the ground. Now what?

We dug a larger hole so we could get down to get a look at it. I couldn’t tell what the pipe went to. It didn’t seem to feed water to anything in our house. The pastor helped me dig, and he couldn’t tell either. The city water guy couldn’t tell either. Finally, we called a plumber to look at it; he couldn’t tell either. A day later his boss came out and he couldn’t tell either!

So now comes the waiting. We waited for the church board approval (since our house is owned by the church). Then we waited for the city guys to come out and mark the ground where pipes and cables and wires run underground. Now, we are waiting to borrow a backhoe from a member of our church who is currently fighting the fire south of town, and the other guy who’s going to run it for us.

It will get done, I’m sure. But in the meantime, we are living out of four buildings! One for clothes washing, one for dishes and showers, and three for bathrooms, but one is closer than the others.
You just have to pretend that my house is a block long with a humongous outdoor atrium…

What’s the longest you’ve gone without water? We’re at 9 days right now. Do you like to rough it? Comment me!

Rule #1: You talk about Blogs From Geekdom. Rule #2: You TALK about Blogs From Geekdom!!!